Jason Maoz describes Deborah Lipstadt’s honorable reaction to C-SPAN’s attempt at moral equivalence this week:
C-SPAN had planned to televise a speech at Harvard by Emory University Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt, whose new book, "History on Trial," recounts her legal victory over Holocaust denier David Irving, who sued her for libel in Britain over material in her 1993 book "Denying the Holocaust."
But then Lipstadt was informed by the sages at C-SPAN that, in the interest of "balance," they’d also be airing an appearance by someone on the other side of the argument — who, it turned out, was none other than David Irving.
Lipstadt refused to go along with this exercise in non-judgmentalism, and, for now at least, it appears that her Harvard speech won’t be seen on C-SPAN.
Richard Cohen, writing in The Washington Post, noted that:
In the end, Lipstadt had to choose between promoting her own book — a terrific read, by the way — and giving Irving the audience of his dreams and a status equal to her own. C-SPAN said it was only seeking fairness, but it was asking Lipstadt to balance truth with a lie or history with fiction.
Maoz notes that Lipstadt has faced this type of media "balance" since the early 1990s:
"(To do so . . . .would elevate their antisemitic ideology — which is what Holocaust denial is — to the level of responsible historiography — which it is not.)
"Unwilling to accept my no as final, she vigorously condemned Holocaust denial and all it represented. Then, in one last attempt to get me to change my mind, she asked me a question: ‘I certainly don’t agree with them, but don’t you think our viewers should hear the other side?’"
As she wrote in "Denying the Holocaust" [1993], describing one of several exasperating encounters with talk show bookers:
"The producer was incredulous. She found it hard to believe that I was turning down an opportunity to appear on her nationally syndicated televised show. . . . "I explained repeatedly that I would not participate in a debate with a Holocaust denier. The existence was not a matter of debate. I would analyze and illustrate who they were and what they tried to do, but I would not appear with them.
LGF’s thread on C-SPAN’s action ("appalling — six million times over") — is here.
UPDATE: Edmund Fawcett, former literary editor for the Economist, has an excellent review of Lipstadt’s book.